Read the Health Affairs article titled, “The Quality Tower of Babel”,
The article points out the plethora of “quality” measures that are being reported by organizations. Explore the following websites: Consumer Reports, US News and World Report, Leapfrog, Health Grades, and Hospital Compare. Based on your exploration of these websites, answer the following questions:

What organization is developing each website? Who is the target audience? What level/ type of data is provided and on which organizations/ individuals? For how many years have they been reporting these measures? Is this data reliable (support your answer)? Is it valid for decision making (explain)?

For each of the websites, list 5-10 individual data measures (be specific) and explain if these are outcome, process or balancing measures. Try to find some measures from each website that represent each type (outcome, process, balancing).

Question 2 1 pts
Pick three related measures from any of the websites in which the organization appears to show an opportunity for improvement. Using these three measures answer the following question:

Explain how each of these measures relates to one of more of the IOM’s six aims.
Explore CMS’s Measure Inventory, specifically those measures in the pipeline. Answer the following questions:

1. How do the pipeline measures complement, expand, or improve the current publicly reported measures?

2. If you were a new patient looking for a provider in your area, which SINGLE of the pipeline measure would be most important to you and why ?

3. If you were a new geriatric internal medicine physician looking to be employed by a hospital in your area, which SINGLE of the pipeline measure would be most important to you and why (choose one)?

4. If you were a new hospital administrator who had recently been hired at a hospital in your area, which SINGLE of the pipeline measure would be most important to you and why (choose three)?

Question 4

Access the County Health Rankings & Roadmaps website.

1. Compare Harris County, TX to Bexar County, TX on 3 Measures for each of 4 different Health Factors including Health Behaviors (12 measures total).

2. Discuss how these two counties compare on Health Outcomes.

3. Select one measure to improve. Access the “What Works for Health” section of the website. Identify two interventions (policy, programs and/or systems change) that could be implemented to improve the measure. One intervention should be targeted to individual-level impact and the other to population-level impact. Comment on evidence rating of the intervention you selected.